New Family Required, page 1
NEW FAMILY REQUIRED
CARMEN REID
For my family – such laughs, such tears, such fun, such fights, such drama, such dogs and so much love.
CONTENTS
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Acknowledgments
More from Carmen Reid
About the Author
About Boldwood Books
PROLOGUE
Mama: WE HAVE BOOKED THE MARQUEE!
Sasha read the brand-new message on the GriffonFamWhatsApp, and before she could reply, in whizzed a response from her big sister.
Adele: A marquee – how amazing!
Sasha wondered if Adele really did think it was amazing, or if she was just being polite. And now her baby brother was jumping in, Mr Biz… Mr Entertainment.
Beaubro: Are they including tables and chairs? Do you need any recommendations for anything? I can get my contacts on it.
Sasha thought she should maybe step away from the phone and let this happy family-chat play out without her. She was totally harassed and not in the mood to hear about this wedding anniversary party fun and frolics.
But, no, she couldn’t help herself from typing…
Sasha: A marquee??? Can I just point out that you live in a 12-bedroomed mansion with four enormous public rooms?
Mama: But it’s such an upheaval… this way we can keep the party contained, plus, a marquee is so romantic. There was no romance to our wedding at all. Just me, your father and a passing witness at the registry office in Paris.
Good grief, let me get out my tiny violin, Sasha thought, but instead typed back:
Sasha: Paris though… must have been a bit romantic.
Mama: C’est vrai… Paris mon amour. So the important question, mes enfants, is can everyone come? Saturday, September 9th. I know school will be on for Sylvie; and Beau, your new baby will only be a few weeks old if he arrives in time.
Sasha: He? I didn’t know the baby was a he. Why does no one tell me nothing?
Mama: Surely it should be ‘anything’?
Sasha: Sigh. Congrats Beau… the first boy grandson… I expect he’ll be spoiled to death…
Adele: Just like his father, you mean?
Ooooh, Sasha thought… that was brave.
There was that pause for a moment when no one typed. Mama always, always denied having a favourite, even though it was plain as the nose on her face that she had always loved Beau the best.
Mama: Now, now… you are all fully grown up with your own children. No more time for these petty squabbles surely?
Petty squabbles… is that what she was calling it now? Beau had been the only one of the three of them to get a freaking pony one Christmas… and what about those trips to Paris with Mama for the sake of his Art GCSE… oh, and let’s not forget the car he got for his twenty-first.
Beaubro: As long as Sura and the baby are fine to travel, we can all come. It will be completely awesome. So glad you and Dad are celebrating. So are you both all set for this weekend?
What were her parents and Beau doing together this weekend? Sasha wondered, feeling the jealous tug that Beau and his family seemed to get far more attention than her family did, right along with the thought that having her parents to stay right now would actually tip her over the edge.
Adele: Sylvie will be working hard for her exams from September onwards. But I want to come and I know she’ll want to come too. So we’ll make it work. Sadly, I think Henry has a work trip that weekend. I’ll check.
That seemed odd… considering Henry was a freelance editor, who rarely went anywhere at all. But then, Adele and Henry were only just getting started with a divorce after twenty-two years together. So maybe they didn’t know how to negotiate family events yet… or even divorced life. Henry was currently living in a lovely basement flat in Adele’s beautiful new modern mansion on the outskirts of Zurich. Yup, you know you’re the failure when every other member of your family has a house with at least three times as many bedrooms as your flat. We’re much more eco-friendly, Sasha reminded herself. And think of their heating bills. Certainly, her mum and dad started complaining mid-August about the prospect of having to put the heating on and then didn’t stop going on about it until the following April.
So, her parents’ fortieth wedding anniversary party… Sasha turned it over in her mind for a few moments. Like most family commitments, she sort of wanted to go but she also sort of didn’t. Right now, a big, swanky family event was about the last thing she needed, but equally, she knew she would regret not going. And both her parents and her siblings would go on at her, probably forever, if she missed it.
Sasha: That weekend in September won’t be a problem for us. Really looking forward to it.
Mama: I am already so excited, thinking about food, menus… I might have to make a special trip to London to get some of the things that are harder to find up here.
Sasha: Let me know nearer the time. Happy to do some gourmet shopping for you. It can be our anniversary gift to you both.
Adele: Must dash… have a Zoom in two. Lovely to hear the party is shaping up. Looking forward to buying a new dress… and the bag… and the shoes. I blame having a French Mama.
Mama sent a heart emoji in response to this.
Sasha: How is Dad? Looking forward to the party?
Mama: Tiens… husbands! They never think they want anything like this and then they always enjoy every minute.
Sasha: Ha ha… big hugs to you all, speak soon xx
She decided to leave it there, put her phone down and turned to her husband, Ben, who was busy with the post-supper dishwasher loading.
‘And how is the Addams family?’ he asked, after one glance at her face.
‘How can you tell?’ she asked.
‘You just have that look… what have they asked you to do now? Join them for their “let’s rent a cute little chateau in France” summer holiday?’
‘No, nothing like that,’ she said, rounding up the last of the dishes on the small kitchen table. ‘Mum and Dad are planning to have a big fortieth anniversary party in September… Saturday 9th September, I think she said.’
Ben immediately groaned and rolled his eyes. ‘Oh no!’ he exclaimed. ‘We’ll have to get all dressed up… drink horrible champagne – why does no one ever, ever offer me a beer up there? – listen to the chat about summer in St Bart’s, or is that where you go in the winter? I can never remember… and the cost of school fees and how you just can’t get anyone decent to lay reclaimed parquet flooring these days. Sounds totally ah-mazing. Meanwhile… here in the real world…’
‘Well, they are my family,’ Sasha reminded him.
‘And they are such hard work,’ Ben complained, as they took up their positions, side by side, at the sink to get the last of the washing-up done – Ben on washing, Sasha drying and putting away, as usual.
‘I do love them, you know,’ Sasha said, but she already knew what Ben was going to say to this.
‘Do you, though?’ he asked, smiling with his eyebrows raised. ‘Really?’
‘You know I do,’ she said.
‘Are you sure it’s not just an unhealthy dependency based on shared past memories?’
‘Isn’t that what all families are?’
This made them both laugh.
‘My family is so much nicer than yours,’ he said.
‘Shut up!’
‘I think the problem is, you just don’t really suit your family…’ he said, taking in Sasha’s short, white-blonde hair, thick eyeliner and general London-cool look. ‘Maybe we could do a family swap? Or take out an ad for you: New Family Required,’ he began. ‘Must live in north London, in nice, manageable family house… warm, caring, loving mother with no interest in Paris, Chanel, make-up or fashion, who just wants to spend time with her grandchildren, doing arts and crafts and reading…’
This made Sasha laugh again, because her mother was nothing like this, which was the point, of course.
‘Dad must be amazing at DIY and staunchly left-of-centre,’ Ben said, again prompting a big laugh from his wife, ‘happiest taking granddaughter to track and field events. Big sister must be regularly available for girlie nights out to drink cocktails and watch Henry Golding movies…’
‘You know me oh-so well,’ Sasha smiled.
‘And little brother… do you even want a new little brother?’ Ben asked.
‘Could he be an ace mechanic… and cook… who is also happy to take me on spa weekends?’
‘That’s perfect,’ Ben replied. ‘Right, let me get this written up and I’ll post it on the Ham & High website.’
‘Very funny… and surely a bit old-school. You’d probably have to make a TikTok to get anyone to pay attention, do a little dance…’ She put her arms around him and looked at him closely. It was good to see him laughing and looking more relaxed.
‘Are you feeling a bit more optimistic about everything?’ she asked.
‘I have no idea,’ was his honest answer, ‘but I do know we can’t worry all the time. Hopefully, the worst won’t happen. Who knows? It might all be so much better by September,’ he added.
Sasha, who had been feeling really quite cheery and hopeful for a few moments there, went back to feeling anxious. ‘Or so much worse,’ she said.
1
FRIDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER
‘Sasha, I don’t want you to worry—’
Good grief! As soon as Sasha heard her husband say these words, she immediately panicked and suspected that the news she had been dreading, the news that she’d so hoped for months now would somehow not arrive, was about to come crashing down on their world with this phone call.
‘But…?’ she asked.
‘The absolutely shameless tossers aren’t going to pay,’ Ben said, sounding calmly furious. And so here it was – the disaster they had been trying to avoid for week after incredibly stressful week.
‘Not going to pay?’ she heard herself repeat, as she tried to take this in. ‘Not anything at all? No goodwill gesture, or monthly instalments, or promise of something further down the line?’
‘No,’ he said, ‘and you know how much I’ve tried, and the accountant has tried, but they have basically made the company that owes us the money bankrupt.’
For several moments, Sasha couldn’t think of anything to say, she just squeezed her eyes shut and tried to carry on breathing.
‘Oh my god…’ she managed finally, ‘so we’re not going to get a single penny of the £75,000 they owe us for the work?’
‘No,’ Ben confirmed, and he sounded completely deflated.
Seventy-five thousand! It was an enormous sum for their little business to bear.
They’d been waiting for this money for months. The work – extensive garden design, landscaping, planting and gardening – had been done back in the early spring at a brand-new housing development. It had been the biggest contract they had landed in five years of trading. They’d had to bring in extra people to help and buy new equipment, not to mention all the plants, trees and materials. In short, they’d borrowed serious money on the back of this contract and after months of worry, to hear that they weren’t going to get any of what was owed to them was devastating.
Yes, they did have some other work on the go, but it was very small-scale and now it was September. There was already the hint of a chill in the air, and autumn and winter lay ahead – always a very quiet time for the business.
‘So… so…’ Sasha sensed her rising panic, ‘what are we going to do? You’re absolutely sure there’s nothing more we can do to get the money we’re owed?’
‘Not right now,’ Ben confirmed. ‘Maybe further down the line when they tender for this kind of work again, but not right now.’
‘You’re absolutely sure?’ she had to ask once again because it was far too big a sum of money to just walk away from if there was still any hope at all.
‘I’m going to go and see Jason tonight to sound him out,’ Ben added, mentioning a friend who was an experienced corporate lawyer. ‘And then… I’ll come home and we’ll talk it through. We’ll brainstorm and we’ll start to get over this. I have lots of ideas and I’m sure you do too.’
‘Oh yes,’ she agreed bitterly, ‘my best idea right now is to drive round to their headquarters and throw bricks through their windows. No, even better, smash up their Range Rovers, carefully and thoroughly with a set of golf clubs, using different clubs for different parts of the car, then slash all the tyres.’
‘I know, Sash, I know,’ Ben said, ‘and that would work off a lot of tension, but I don’t see how a criminal conviction would be a massive help to us at the moment.’
‘If anyone deserves a criminal conviction, it’s them! This is just so unfair!’ she protested. ‘Those houses are still for sale! Their companies are still going to make millions. How can they get out of paying our bill?’
‘Clever accounting, apparently,’ Ben said, and she heard the bitterness in his voice. ‘Development companies do it all the time… apparently.’
‘I see,’ said Sasha, ‘and that’s why they’ve picked some little, small-fry company like ours to completely stitch up, is it?’
‘Maybe,’ he admitted.
‘Ben, we’ve got no money left,’ she reminded him. ‘What are we supposed to do about the bills that we need to pay? We’ve had the mortgage on hold for three months; there’s the VAT bill; those final instalments for the rotivator… and… so many other things! What do we do about all that? And there’s hardly any money left in our personal account.’
‘We’ll talk it through when I get home,’ he assured her. And she wondered how he could even be trying to sound so calm, when she felt like running round the room and screaming at the top of her voice.
‘We are so close to our overdraft limits on the business and the personal accounts,’ she reminded him.
‘I know,’ he said.
‘We’ll have to arrange bigger loans… I don’t even know if we can… they’ll want to charge us a lot of interest. And… we’re not the crooks… we’re not even bad at business!’ she complained, really not willing to accept yet what had happened. ‘We’ve been defrauded, Ben! There should be a way to get this money back! We’re just two ordinary people with a small business that will now very likely go…’ Sasha paused. She didn’t want to use the word. She wasn’t ready to accept it. They had done everything, every single thing they could think of to get this money: they had made a beautiful job of the contracted work; they had opened up endless conversations with the development company; they had talked to their accountant at length and at further expense; even filed a claim through legal channels.
They’d borrowed a lot of money to do this work. They’d cut their own personal costs to the bone and still this was now happening. They were not going to get paid. They were very likely going to go bust… broke… bankrupt… all those terrible words. All the words she’d never, ever wanted to apply to them.
‘Sash, I know,’ Ben repeated, ‘but we will sort this out. We will handle it and we will get through it.’
Ben was by nature a charming and delightful optimist. He always wanted to believe that everything could be okay again, that it could still be sorted out and they would get to a better place. He didn’t ever want to join Sasha in the doom spiral. But for weeks now, she had been gripped by the doom spiral. She had been sure they were not going to get the money and she was exhausted with trying to cope with this eventuality and trying to work out a clear and sensible way forward.
They had a cosy little ground-floor flat in a London suburb, which they’d been slowly making their own over the years they’d owned it, and now she regularly woke up in the middle of the night, panicked that they would have to sell it. Meanwhile, Ben remained calmly confident that life could still be breathed back into their mortally wounded company.
